Wong Kar-wai to adapt “I Belonged To You”

According to a new report from Hong Kong’s The Standard, Wong Kar-wai will shoot his next film in 2015. Mei Ah Entertainment are producing, with their chief executive Patrick Tong Hing-chi hinting it will be a romantic movie, adding that the main actor is someone “all women are crazy about.” Tong refused to say whether it is another collaboration with Tony Leung Chiu-wai, who has starred in seven of Wong’s eleven movies.

Wong Kar-wai is set to adapt a short story from the collection I Belonged to You 從你的全世界路過 for his next film. Author Zhang Jiajiaconfirmed the news yesterday on his Weibo microblog.

Originally published on the internet as “bedtime stories”, the book is divided into 38 chapters. It is described as a “cluttered” collection of love stories written in the style of a “friend narrating his tales to you in the middle of the night.”

Wong is adapting the chapter called 擺渡人 (literally Ferryman), about an affair between a girl and a married artist in Changchun. Rights for individual chapters of the book have reportedly been sold to other film companies, but Wong’s adaptation is the first that has been officially announced by Zhang himself.

According to its publisher, stories from the book have been reposted 1.5 million times on Chinese microblogs. In book form it has reportedly sold over two million copies. Zhang previously co-wrote the script of Wuershan’s The Butcher, the Chef and the Swordsman.

Zhang wrote that the film is set to begin shooting soon with a very strong cast. Earlier this month,Mei Ah’s Patrick Tong told local media that Wong was preparing to shoot a romance in 2015.